Names

We have the hardest time picking a name for our kids. It wasn't until the doctors put needles to our heads before we decided on Bryten and Cody. We had some names picked out but just couldn't make that final decision. We're both bad a making decisions. Our weekends consist of this, "What do you want to do?, I don't know what do you want to do?" until its too late to do anything. Sometimes I'm supprised that we do or buy anything. So picking a name that our kids will have to live with for the rest of their lives is not an easy task for us.

Here is our list of names. Take a look and let us know what you think.

Boy Names
Chase
Demetri
Deeken
Jacob (Jake)
Brenden
Seth
Camden
Breckan
Jonas
Landon
Carson
Ryder

Girl Names
AJ
Catheryen (Kat)
Mikelle (Micky)
Nicole (Nikki)
Lily
Taye
Baily
Cambree
Isabelle
Scarlett

Yeah, I can dance!

Ok, really I can't dance but now we will be spending the summer watching 'So you think you can dance'. We all love it. I tried to get T to try out when they came to SL in February but she said she couldn't cause she was pregnant. What a lousy excuse. Of course Marcee's and Haeli's excuses were much worse. It is the only reality show that we watch, kinda. If I watch the first episode of one of those date shows, I'm hooked for the whole thing and I did waste most of Memorial day watching the 'Deadliest Catch'.

I miss the writers strike, we didn't have any teevee to watch, we watch way too much. I'm glad that the season is over. Here is our list of what we watch

Together we watch

Smallville
Scrubs
The Office
So You Think You Can Dance
Heroes


I also watch
SNL
Sunday Morning

and when I can
The Daily Show
The Colbert Report
Democracy Now
The Simpson's

and when I'm bored
Big and Rob
History Channel
Discovery Channel - Dirty Jobs, Deadliest Catch,
Miami/LA Ink
House

We won't even begin to list the shows that T watches.

Attack!

Yes! I won this game!

I have a few profiles around the various sites, Myspace, Facebook, Okurt and Friendster. I was pretty addicted to Myspace for a couple of months, constantly scouring over profiles and groups, then it just got old. Now I visit a couple times a week to check on friends and to see if I have any messages.

When my work blocked Myspace there was a mass exodus to Facebook because it was still accessible, so I joined along. Facebook was ok, not as interesting as Myspace was but then I found Attack! and now I am on Facebook at least three times a day. It's probably a good thing that they blocked Facebook at work also because I would probably play Attack! all day long. It's risk on the computer and you can play against friends in games that you take your turn whenever you are available or you can play live games against anyone else who is on Facebook and wanting to play Attack!. The live games are fun, they last up to 30 minutes and can be interesting. It took me some time before I won my first live game. My favorite is when people start smack talking each other and then they just make really dumb moves because they're to worried about calling some names about a computer game.

New Used Car

We've been married for six and a half years and we have bought a house, a kitchen, a dog, all sorts of worthless crap, and now we just bought our first car together! Yeah! We're pretty excited. When we got married I had my nissan and T had her protege, then Mary Ann bought a Pilot, and gave us her 626 (thanks Mary Ann) and we passed the protege on to Dani. I sold my truck and we tried the one car thing for about a year. Ya....ask our family how that worked. It actually wasn't bad 90% of the time, it was the other 10% that made life difficult. It will be nice to have two cars again but I will try to continue taking the bus and bumming rides to work from Jeremy.



It is a '04 Honda Pilot with just over 73k miles. Since Mary Ann bought her Pilot we have wanted one. Haeli bought a Pilot the exact same color as Mary Anns so our one requirement was not to get that color. We would never know who's car is who's.

We looked a little at mini vans, they were around the same price if not more and the gas mileage wasn't that much better to persuade us. We don't do as much camping as we would like, I blame it on the kids, but we do enough that I would rather have the Pilot over a mini van, then I won't have to listen to T yelling at me not to drive her van down a dirt road. "This is not your truck! It's my CAR!!" Ya, from personal experience.

We've been looking for a new car since we found out that we were adding another little one to the gang. T is the KSL champ! First she found our dog Coco now she found our car on KSL the day it was it went up. We bought it from this little dealership in Bountiful, Hedberg Solomon Auto Sales from Troy Solomon. I'm not a big fan of car salesmen and I hate buying and selling cars but this place was nice, they didn't push and gave us plenty of space. If your in the market for a used car check these guys out. They sell lease returns that they buy from auctions and they have some pretty good prices. I feel that we got a pretty good deal, as long as the tires don't fall off!

Black Eyed Bart

Dont' mess with Black eyed bart! He'll take ya down! I tell him to tackle Gaven or Zack and he lays into them.

Cody is almost 2 and he is on his 3rd black eye, only one is from me, just kidding. He had his first one for his first birthday. I don't remember how he got it.



His second black eye was just about a month or two ago. He was playing where b plays soccer at the University of Utah's field house around some football equipment and fell.

It was worse but this is about the only pic we have of it.


This time, they were playing on grandma's swing set and he ran behind the teater tater and got it in the eye.

Mothers Day

I'm always at least a week behind my postings. We did the usual mothers day activities, made blue berry muffins for T, went to church to get the Flower. We were late and so b wasn't there to sing in the primary song, she was sad that she missed it. We're always late for everything. We felt bad.

We then went to my parents, bought her and T's mom flowers for their gardens (same gift every year). Ate at my moms and hung out a bit. The Walters were not there, so it was nice and not so crazy. There shouldn't be NBA final games on mothers day, its not fair to the mothers.

Then we went to T's mom, Zack was sick so buzz wasn't there. We hung out for a bit, I took a nice nap.

We took some pics that have nothing to do with mothers day.





With my grandma

Utah Jazz

Well, now I don't "have" to watch any more basketball but I'm sure I will. San Antonio and LA should be a good series. Boston needs to wake up and start playing like they were during the regular season if they want to beat Cleavland or Detroit let alone LA.

Can't say anything bad about the Jazz. They are every bit as good as LA just not as experienced and LA has some big guys that the Jazz can't stop. I guess we'll see what happens in the off season and what kind of team they'll have next year. I won't know until the playoffs next season, that's about all the pro-ball I can handle. To be honest I started playing computer games half way through the third quarter. I couldn't watch it any more. The Jazz could have and should have won games 1 and 5 but couldn't finish with the pressure. I really think it has a lot to do with Sloan, who will remain the coach with the most playoff games without winning a championship. He's had some great teams there and they can never finish, I think the Jazz will never win a championship while he is the coach.

WOW! I think that I have blogged way too much on basketball. With any luck this will be the last one until Final Four '09.

On other news we are looking for a car and probably have one. A red Honda Pilot. We'll know for sure next week.

The Schubert Singers

My grandmother sings in a choir and they have a concert this Saturday. The Schubert Singers are singing May 17th @ 7 pm, @ The Waterford School 1480 East 9400 South enter from 1700 east.

They are really good and enjoyable. Bring the kids and enjoy. It is free admission, they do accept donations but it's not required.

Self Check-Outs

Self check outs are a blessing and a curse. They are fast and easy, and the lines almost always move faster then the other lines. They've been around for some time now and I would think that everyone has used them. I do remember that I was a bit nervous the first time I used one but it was so simple now thats about all I ever use.

The worst is at Home Depot where if you buy something small and doesn't weight very much, after you scan it the weight thingy doesn't register it as being put in the bag. "Please put the item in the bag, please put the item in the bag" ITS THERE!!!

But worse then that is when your in a hurry or even not in a hurry at the grocery store and people using the self-check outs are taking soooo long. How hard is it? It's basic and self explanatory! My 4 year old knows how do it and even insist that she scan the groceries. Maybe they should start teaching people how to use self check outs in school or maybe the stores should have classes that people can take.

Tonight at the grocery store was great. First the Smiths we go to always has long lines, they never have more then two checkers and the self check out lines are always long. Finally I'm next in line and it felt like I was there forever. One lady was just standing there for like five minutes and I couldn't understand why until her husband brought her purse to her. Then another guy couldn't get the money taker to take his bills and another lady couldn't get her credit card working.

I would hate the job of the checker who has to help people at the self check out. They probably get so tired of explaining to people how to work it. I think it would be fun to take a full basket of groceries through the self check out. I'm sure that would make a lot of people mad.

Note:
I hope I don't offend anyone with this post. I sometimes have a hard time with the upc codes.

Game 5

Kobe is over rated.

If the Lakers could get any more calls their way, the whole game would be them shooting foul shots. Kobe Bryant gets everything called his way, I honestly don't think he would be half of what he is without his defender getting called for a foul every time they touch him. Half the time Kobe is playing half-back, lowering his shoulder, pushing off and the defender still gets the foul. It is amazing!!! The fouls that are called on the Jazz the Lakers are able to commit without a whistle. I now remember why I don't watch NBA. The refs suck and are inconsistent. It's amazing that Gasel can push everyone out of the way and not get a foul.

Foul Shots Jazz - Lakers
Game 1 30-46
Game 2 16-43
Game 3 37-28
Game 4 25-45
Game 5 28-42
Total 136-204


Honestly!


In every game except game 3 the Lakers had substantially more foul shots. People might say its because the Jazz play hard and cheap. I don't buy it. Kobe gets the "MVP" calls and the league wants the Lakers to play Boston and thats what will happen.

What has happened to Boozer this series? It will go to game 7 and the Jazz will lose.


Go Boston!!

Price Sticking it to Walton

Rose Park Festival

I'm a few weeks late on this. April 26th we held the fourth annual Rose Park Community Festival. It was a great success with an estimated 3,000 people moving in and out. The weather was sunny but a little too windy with a bit of a chill but still enjoyable. Entertainment was good, the belly dancers looked a little cold and the last singer was more then out of key.

The food this year wasn't as good as last year, only two choices this year three less from last, some incredible Thai food that was there last year and hopefully in the years to come along with hot dogs and hamburgers from Diamond Lils.

There was cotton candy and snow cones provided by the Southern Baptist. Around 20 or so non-profits providing information material. A couple of people selling stuff and a couple companies trying to find employees. T and Jen didn't sell any tutus but Marcee did sell a few hair barrettes.

Plenty of fun for the kids with crafts and games and a dunking booth. City Councilman Luke Garrett volunteered to be dunked and was more then once. The car show was a little less than steller with two hot rods but the motorcycle patrol showed off their sweet rides.

I was too busy with other things to take pictures but there are plenty on the Rose Park Festival website.

Coco

Growing up we always had a dog. Kima was the first dog that I remember, she was a very good dog. Then Odie, a very fat dog and with Odie we had Sara a large Shepard/malamute mix who liked to bite people. Everyone was scared of her. My dad and myself were the only ones who could control her except when she would get out of the yard and run around the neighborhood. After Sara we had Misty and Odie until Odie was gone. Now Misty is gone and my parents got Juno who is a little fur ball. Juno likes to attack hair and sometimes when we're just sitting around not at my parents, Cody will just start talking about Juno attacking his head.

All of this is working up to Coco. T has wanted a dog since we were married but she didn't want to get one while Sam her dog at her parents house was still around. Sam passed last summer and she has been talking about getting a dog. I have picked up dog crap all of my life. I'm not a fan of dog crap and I hate it in the grass. Even when you do pick it up, it leaves crap on the grass. Gross!!! I like walking around the yard without shoes and that's impossible with a dog and all its crap in the grass.

Still working up to Coco. Then both of my sisters get kittens, thats all b could talk about is wanting kittens. T doesn't want a cat and neither do I, had one of those around my whole childhood. I have always said no to pets, no cats, no dogs. Then one day I just changed my mind. Thought that it would be good for the kids and for T when I'm out of town. We started looking for a dog. There are so many dogs for sale I had no idea, and their expensive! Whatever happened to free dogs?

We thought about getting one from a shelter, most of those said they weren't good with kids and we wanted a smaller dog so that limited it even further. We ended up getting Coco from a soldier who had been on medical leave for a couple of years and was heading back to Iraq. He had been home with Coco just about every day and didn't want to leave his dogs (he had two, the other one was sold before we got there or we might have ended up with both) home all day while his wife went to work and his kid to school. That should have been a warning sign of a high maintenance dog.

We brought him home and Cody was in love and b wasn't sure. She kept saying that we needed to take him back. He needs a lot of attention. A lot. He is a three year old Malti-Poo Maltese/Poodle. No potty training. For the most part he is really good with the kids, he plays kinda ruff but allows some ruff love from the kids before he growls. He snaps at Cody regularly, but most of the time Cody deserves it, pulling Coco's tall, hair, laying on him, holding his feet. B tries to give Coco loves and he sometimes growls and snaps, b hates that, yells at him. Tells Coco he's a bad dog, mean dog, stupid dog, poopoo dog, I'm never going to be your friend. She tells those things to me when I'm teasing her, just replace the dog with dad or guy.

T is in charge of Coco, feeding him and cleaning up his crap. She's slacking on cleaning up the crap but I will let it slide until after the next kid pops out. Then she better be on top of it. Right now Coco sleeps with us, that drives me nuts! Hopefully soon he will start sleeping with the kids. I'm going to lock him out of our room. Coco took a liking to T and he follows her everywhere, he even sits out in the hall while she showers.

We'll see how this goes. It might be our last dog.


Coco and Juno

Conversation with Cody

Here is the typical conversation with Cody lately

Cody: daddy......daddy......daddy

me: what up?

Cody: hi

me: hi cody

Cody: daddy.....daddy

me: what up?

Cody: hi

me: hi cody

me: whats up dude?

Cody: whats up dude?

Cody: hi daddy

me: what are you doin?

Cody: what?.......what?

me: whats up dude?

Cody: whats up dude?


Minutes later

Cody: daddy......daddy

me: whats up?

Cody: hi

Life made even easier

I wish I was smart enough to turn a brilliant idea into reality. I think of helpful and cool new tech-nodes but I'm lucky if I can even work this blog. This Eye-fi is a memory card for your digital camera with wifi technology, meaning that you no longer need to use wires to download pics off your card.

Vegas Baby

We spent a couple of days in Vegas this last week. First time with kids. You know your old when you are walking through the casino pushing a stroller and carrying stuffed animals. We made a midnight run down there leaving around 9pm, its been a while since I have done one of those. It was the longest drive ever and I seemed to get less tired the closer we got to Vegas. It was good and bad, it was good because the kids slept almost the whole time, b tried to stay awake and made it to Nephi. Cody woke up just after Mesquite. It was bad because they both were wide awake and ready to go at 3am when we got to the hotel. We didn't think they were ever going to sleep.


Walking into the Paris, thats were we stayed, first thing I see is a transvestite. Welcome to Vegas! At 3am you'd expect everyone to be asleep but then again we were in Vegas and it was jump'n. We ended up going to bed every night around 11 Vegas time, which is actually midnight Salty time yet still early for being in Vegas. Our kids are still trying to readjust.

I have decided that Vegas is close to Death Valley for a reason, crap flows down hill and Vegas is about as close to the bottom as you can get.



The kids had a blast. I think they would have a blast in any hotel where they could go swimming. Our room overlooked the pool, only to make it worse. The first thing the kids would do in the morning would be to go and look out the window and say they wanted to go swimming and then thats about all they could think about. I was there for a work conference so T would take them swimming in the afternoon. She kept them all pretty busy, plenty of places to go shopping. B was funny, anytime they would go somewhere she just wanted to go back to "our" hotel, she wanted to eat and shop and everything else in "our" hotel. T took them to the Vegas Temple and found an Olive Garden on one of the days.



Never go to Circus Circus! The food was way too expensive and it was horrible, so bad that it made me sick. The place is dirty and gross. We watched a couple of the circus performances, the trapeze was pretty cool and the kids were memorized. The next act was a very flexible lady who I think was confused which job she was at. She was a little provocative for being a kids circus act.

Weeds

If I have to weed my "flower bed" every other week all summer I'm going to put a torch to it. I've tried to xeriscape one of my parking strips, I have three because I live on the corner, to cut down on grass. It's not very good looking, plants are way too expensive and half of the ones we bought last year died. The city did plant a tree for me and as long as I can keep it alive I don't have to pay for it.

My yard needs so much help. Did finally get a garden ready for this year. We have planted peas every year, last year I planted some strawberries and raspberries but way too late in the season and they didn't last very long. This year I planted them much much earlier and they are doing awesome. No raspberries this year but next we should get the hook up. Now I need to plant an apple and a peach tree, trees are expensive. I should try and grow them by seed.

On another note, felt pretty good about myself the other day. I made some OJ for Cody, he clapped and cheered "yeah daddy!"

Belgian Graduation

Now why didn't we do this at our graduation? What a sticky mess. I'm sure my mom is in tears watching this, all that wasted diet coke!

Where Amazing Happens?

Who honestly has the time to make these videos?




I'm not much for pro-ball, they are a bunch of babies who make way too much money. I do get caught up into the whole play-off buzz. It's about the only pro-ball that I watch all year and I probably won't watch a whole lot the games 'till the Championship.

The Jazz are doing what they do best, keep you on the edge of your seat, while switching alliances, love the Jazz, hate the Jazz. I personally love Kevin Garnet, he is the man!! So I'm cheering for Boston this year.

At work we have all filled out our brackets, I do have the Jazz going to the Western Conference championship game but losing to New Orleans. I should have picked the Lakers but thats hard because I really hate the Lakers almost as much as I hate the Suns.